


a good place to start

by hufflebee



Series: queer!izzy verse [1]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Coming out (sort of), F/F, Self-Acceptance, Sexuality talk, izzy figuring out her sexuality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-22
Packaged: 2018-10-09 06:21:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10405878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hufflebee/pseuds/hufflebee
Summary: It started with a girl without a name, or at least, Isabelle had never learned it.inspired by a tumblr post: ”…just??? isabelle lightwood not having to know exactly who she is and what she wants, being allowed to be unsure and taking time to figure herself out, because she tries so hard to be everything for everyone but herself and it seems unlikely to me that she’d just hit puberty and immediately come out with full confidence about her sexuality.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted on tumblr (hufflebee) & inspired by this post: http://softpinkjace.tumblr.com/post/158382352641/sunlightwood-okay-so-theres-a-lot-of
> 
> i hope you enjoy <3

It started with a girl without a name, or at least, Isabelle had never learned it.

Izzy was 17 and she had just finished a patrol with her brothers. She convinced them to go with her to a club, Jace agreed because he wanted to go, and Alec would never leave them unprotected. (“We can take care of ourselves, Alec.” “I know, I’m still staying.”)

Jace was off flirting with some girl, Alec was standing at the bar, and Izzy was dancing on her own in the crowd when she made eye contact with a girl wearing a little black dress, her hair wild, her make up smudged, but her eyes shined and her smile lit up her entire presence. The girl smiled at Izzy and Izzy smiled back, suddenly feeling nervous, almost shy.

The girl walked towards her, confident and beautiful, and just as she reached Izzy, the song switched to something even more upbeat and the girl smiled wider and began to dance in front of Izzy, _with_ Izzy. At some point the girl’s hands found their way to Izzy’s hips and Izzy placed her hands on the girl’s shoulders. She doesn’t know how many songs stopped and started as they danced; it felt like an entire separate world was created within their arms. Which was why Izzy was so startled when another girl appeared beside them, tapping the girl Izzy was dancing with on the shoulder and pointing to the exit.

The girl nodded and turned to Izzy, gave her a small smile before kissing her cheek and walking away. 

Just like that.

Izzy brought her hand up to her cheek, her ghost of the girl’s lips still there and maybe if she pressed her hand to the spot, the feeling would never go away.

She stood there for a moment before she felt a hand on her arm, turning to see Jace motioning towards the second exit, Alec a few steps behind him. Still dazed, she just nodded and followed them out.

It wasn’t until they’d arrived at the Institute that she noticed Alec watching her, no, _observing_ her, with a strange look on his face.

“What?” she asked when they were alone, just about to part ways to their own rooms.

“Nothing,” Alec said, shaking his head and before Izzy could prod him further, he wrapped his arms around her. She froze for a second, caught off guard by Alec initiating a hug seemingly out of nowhere, before returning the embrace.

And Izzy noticed that Alec held her a little tighter, a little longer, and when he pulled away he pressed a kiss to her hair.

“I love you, okay? No matter what,” he said as he pulled away, his voice quiet but firm, and Izzy could only stare at him.

“Okay,” she said, unable to think of anything else to tell her brother and just when she opened her mouth to ask him where all this was coming from, he turned and went to his room, leaving her alone and confused in the hallway.

Later that night, she had been unable to fall asleep, thinking and worrying about Alec, and when exhaustion finally caught up to her, she dreamed of the mystery girl from the club, about the dancing and the kiss on the cheek. Then the dream added to reality and the girl pressed a kiss to Izzy’s lips.

Just then, Izzy’s alarm went off and she jerked awake, lost for a moment before she had the thought to turn her alarm off. She sat there, the sounds of other people’s footsteps and conversations filling the silence of her room. The final image from her dream was already fading from her mind, but it was only replaced by the countless thoughts suddenly running through her head.

Did she want to kiss that girl?

_Yes._

What would she have done had the girl actually kissed her?

_She would have kissed her back._

The sudden weight in her chest made her entire body feel ice cold. She couldn’t feel this way. She knew what this meant in their world, had observed it well enough, especially after she noticed the way Alec –

 _Alec_.

Did he know? Did he see her dancing with the girl in the club and put it together, before Izzy even realized there was anything _to_ put together? By the Angel, is this how he feels every day, this heaviness of knowing you can never say something out loud, not even knowing what it is even?

She got up and got ready on autopilot, heading straight into the training room without making eye contact with anyone. She spent the entire day training, tiring out her mind and body, burying the girl and the dream deep inside her mind. She thought back to the day when Alec told her, without actually telling her, that he had feelings for Jace.

She had spent that entire day researching, trying to find ways to help and comfort her brother. She remembered how she’d stumbled upon the words lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, how she had made a mental note of them, without thinking much of it. The words popped into her head as she was kicking and striking the punching bag in front of her, but she buried them right alongside the dream and the girl.

When Alec came in a few hours later, she ran to him and hugged him, holding him tight, and he had returned the embrace, a quiet understanding settling between them.

After that, she didn’t think about it, she buried it away; she never brought it up to anyone. She never pushed Alec to talk about the way he was looking at Jace, because he never pushed her to talk about that night.

She continued to flirt with Seelies, vampires, werewolves, Shadowhunters; she continued to rebel against the absurdity of the Clave’s opinion on Downworlders, but she never flirted with girls and when she caught herself staring at them, she buried it under countless excuses.

_I was just admiring her form._

_I was just wishing my legs looked like that._

_I was just admiring her shoes._

_I was just wondering what shade of lipstick that was_.

And if there was one thing Shadowhunters knew how to do, perhaps were even better at it than actual demon hunting, was burying feelings where no one would ever find them.

* * *

 

Despite the countless problems that had come up since they met Clary, Izzy could not be happier to have her in her life. After spending her entire life with Alec and Jace, having a female friend felt so nice, so wonderful in a way that’s different to how having her brothers in her life felt.

Having a close female friend is a new, but precious thing to Izzy, so the first time Izzy caught herself thinking about kissing Clary, she had pushed the thought aside before she even fully thought it, the habit of burying these thoughts second nature to her by now. But this was different from all the other times, all the other thoughts, because Clary was constantly there, constantly smiling at Izzy, casually touching her, hugging her, and at one point, Izzy’s subconscious became stronger than the defense mechanism Izzy had developed over the years.

The dream started with Clary and her in Izzy’s room, talking, laughing, and Clary reached out her hand to tuck a piece of Izzy’s hair behind her ear, but her hand lingered on Izzy’s face and suddenly they were kissing, soft and warm. The scene changed then, Clary on top of her, kissing her neck as Izzy ran her hands over Clary’s legs, then they were both down to their underwear and Izzy was toying with the hem of Clary’s panties, and just as she made a move to take them off, she wakes up, sitting up on her bed abruptly, unable to catch her breath.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

It feels like every thought, every feeling she’d tucked away over the years is suddenly crashing down on her, and before she can even think about what she’s doing, she’s on her feet, walking over to Alec’s room.

She opens the door and climbs into Alec’s bed, something she hadn’t done in years, not since they were both kids. He wakes up immediately, a look of confusion and surprise on his face, but he shifts to his back and Izzy cuddles up to his side as he wraps an arm around her.

They lay in silence for a bit, and when Izzy’s breathing finally calms down, she whispers a question against Alec’s chest.

“How did you know?”

“Know what?” he asks, just as quietly.

“That you liked boys.”

She feels him freeze for a split second, but he doesn’t let go of her, in fact, he pulls her even closer. It’s silent again for a while, before Alec speaks.

“I’m not sure how to explain it.”

Izzy lifts her head up to look at Alec, only to find him looking at the ceiling and while Izzy was fully prepared to beg him to try and explain, she recognizes her brother’s thinking face, knows she should just be silent as he gathers his thoughts.

“I’ve always noticed guys, but I mostly ignored it, buried it, until Jace, maybe even Magnus,” Alec says after a little while. “Because even when I figured out what these feelings meant, even when I knew I was gay, I could dismiss it as something imagined, fake, until it became about a specific person, then it felt all too real.

“I think that’s mostly what my crush on Jace was; way for it to feel real, valid, without me having to come out, without me having to really face it.  It’s why I hanged onto it long after it actually faded.”

Izzy listens intently, absorbing every word and part of her could cry tears of joy because she can identify with what Alec is saying so much, but a part of her wants to run, wants to bury everything back where it was.

Still, listening to her brother talk and be so open about this, seeing him, not just now, but every day, happier than she ever has, seeing him loved and love someone so fully, she decides that maybe, it’s time for her to face this.

She opens her mouth to speak, but the words still get caught somewhere between her mind and her mouth, so she lays back down on her brother’s chest and mumbles into it.

“I don’t know for sure, but I think I might be a lesbian, or maybe I’m bisexual or pansexual, I don’t know.”

And by the Angel, she has never felt such a relief in just saying a single sentence, but she feels the dread and fear, the voice of her mother, the nameless voices of other Shadowhunters, all creeping in on the edges of her mind, but before they swallow her whole, she feels Alec press a kiss to her hair.

“Well, I think you’re awesome.”

Izzy lets out a laugh then, and starts crying softly into Alec’s chest. She cries from sheer relief of finally, _finally_ , having said the words out loud, she cries from the dread she feels when she thinks about saying them again, she cries because her brother loves her, no matter what.

She may not know what all these feelings mean, not yet, and she is terrified of figuring them out, but having Alec here, holding her, murmuring comforting words into her hair, reminds her of a very important fact. The love her brothers and her friends have for her is a source of unlimited strength, of unconditional safety and acceptance.

With that, she feels like she can face anything. Even these feelings and thoughts that have been buried in her mind for years. Because even though some part of her always knew it would be worth it to face them, she finally has enough faith in that to do something about it.

And that, she thinks just before she falls asleep, is a good place to start.


End file.
